upon a bar of wood, or piece of turf, under the aperture through which the muzzle is presented, and as there is no occasion for hurry, the most deadly aim can easily be taken, especially when a large flight of ducks is to be fired into. I have known one man kill as many as forty wild ducks in one night and morning, for it is only during the evening and morning flights that any number of shots are had; wild-fowl rarely move during the night, when once settled to their feeding places, unless, by some accident, they may have been disturbed; but sometimes a shot or two is had when the moon is up.

The places selected for the building of the huts are various; if on private property, permission. must be obtained from the proprietor, and this is rarely refused; but, in some localities, certain positions are so very favourable and lucrative, that they are let by the proprietors to the huttiers by the season; but, generally speaking, fourfifths of the huttiers make their huts on bien communal,' where they have a right to do so if they belong to the commune; and as all along the sea-coast, at least in those parts where I have resided, there has always been a vast extent of marais, or marsh, which has been bien communal,' the poorer classes experienced no obstacle to their obtaining their living in this manAnd no porte d'arme is required.

ner.

6

There is a sort of tacit understanding between the buttiers not to interfere with one another; so that when a huttier has once taken up a position, he maintains it year after year, without being interfered with by his brother huttiers. Sometimes huts are located within a quarter of a mile of the sea-coast, sometimes at a distance of six or more miles, the remote places being as good, sometimes better, than those in the immediate vicinity of the sea: the essential point is to be either near the feeding-ground, or in the line of flight taken by the wild-fowl night and morning.

I resided during several winters close to a large marais, which was distant about seven miles from the sea. In and about this there were from thirty to fifty huts; and as the place of my abode, at this season of the year, was not more than half a mile from the scene of operations, I used constantly during night to hear the report of the huttiers' guns, which resounded along the marshy ground more like small cannon than fowling-pieces; but as the arm generally used by these men is an old musket converted into a copper cap gun, and will carry a pretty good charge, the loudness of the report can be well understood, somewhat augmented by the stillness of the night.

The summer season is generally selected for the building of huts, in order that they may be made warm, dry, and comfortable: they are ordi

narily sufficiently capacious to contain two persons and a dog. The places selected are sometimes on small islands or promontories commanding a view over two pieces of water surrounded by reeds and rushes, occasionally at the edge of a piece of water, sometimes exactly in the centre of it, if the water be what is called an overflow, or artificial, which it very frequently is, by being supplied from some neighbouring canal or stream, and contained within certain boundaries by sods and turf conveyed and placed there by the huttiers. When this is the case, the hut is almost invariably placed in the centre; and as the water is only knee-deep, the huttier walks through with his marais-boots, fixes his decoy-ducks to their different positions, and picks up his dead and wounded birds after a shot without difficulty; whereas, in deep water, a man requires a dog to fetch his birds, and a boat to convey him to and from his hut, if it be on an island. The most convenient places, therefore, are where the water is shallow, and are frequently quite as good as those where the water is deep, if the spot be judiciously selected relatively to the line of flight of the fowl; and this is easily ascertained, as it is a curious fact in natural history, respecting the instincts of birds of passage, that year after year they may be observed arriving and departing to and from precisely the same direction, as if a road were marked out in the heavens

for them to pursue. And they have also a certain line of flight at night, when they come inland to their feeding-ground; so much so, that sportsmen, in many places, remain in the evening to await the flight at particular spots, and have good sport.

In the beginning of the month of November, I have frequently observed the arrival of wildfowl of all kinds, together with plovers and snipes, all coming from the same direction against the wind, as if they had all one destined point to reach; and although all these birds of passage invariably travel against the wind, the large and various flights scarcely ever arrive except the breeze is sharp and cutting. A moderate breeze, although in a favourable quarter, is seldom attended by any large flights of fowl. From the 28th of October to the beginning of November, I have generally observed the largest flights of all sorts of birds of passage. On the 28th of October, in the year 1828, at Montreuil, in France, I witnessed the arrival of the greatest amount of snipes, ducks, teal, and plover, I ever saw in my life. The wind was blowing strong from the south-east, and had been in that quarter previously through the night. During the whole of the day I observed large flights arriving-snipes dropping in the marais, plovers upon the plain, ducks and teal in the river, and in different large pieces of water

in the marais. All the huttiers were of course out on the night succeeding this arrival of the wild fowl, this being a signal for the commencement of their nocturnal operations. I killed, in four consecutive days, 120 snipes, with some few teal, ducks, and golden plover. The amount killed by the huttiers, of ducks and teal, was large.

The huttiers seldom kill any other wild fowl from their huts than the common wild duck and teal. Flights of widgeon will not drop to the call of the decoy-ducks. Sometimes I have known them kill a bird called le rouge,' which is considered in France the best eating of all the wildfowl it is generally very fat when in good condition. The male bird has a reddish breast, and the bill is large, flat, and round. It is not, however, what we call the red widgeon; if anything, it is rather smaller. I have never met with these birds in either England or Scotland; I therefore suppose they are not very common, and have only very rarely shot them in France. I have frequently shot in the river both dun birds and pintail, with many other varieties of the duck species.

I will now endeavour to describe how the hut is constructed, and give some slight detail of subsequent operations. When the spot is fixed on, and the size decided, a little trench is dug round the external circumference, to a depth sufficient